GAME apologises for website outage

Two weeks after the launch of its brand new website, retailer GAME has apologised for the disruption that the troubled period has caused for its customers.

Problems have included website outages, locked accounts, pre-order and account management issues and quirks with both the Reward Points and order cancellation systems.

Here is the statement in full:

Since we launched our new website at end of August we have experienced some issues that have affected some of our customers. We would like to apologise for any inconvenience these issues may have caused and want to take this opportunity to share with you what happened and what we have been doing about it.

Locked Accounts - When we moved the customer accounts from our old system to our new one, a very limited number of account credentials were slightly altered. We identified the issue and resolved it for the majority of customers. However, due to the secure nature of our data tools, there remain a few of accounts that are still inaccessible. If you are unable to access your account, we would recommend that you first follow the "forgotten" password process as outlined here on our "

Forgotten Password Page". If that doesn work then please contact our Customer Service team via email at customer.services@game.co.uk

Preorders Confirmation - We know how important your preorders are and have worked hard to ensure that we meet our Preorder Promise. There have been delays in transmitting Pre-order Despatch emails, but this has not delayed the processing of any orders. We do appreciate that it can be worrying to not have received confirmation of your preorder's despatch, but can reassure you that we will continue to ship preorders in time for release date whilst we resolve the email issue.

Missing orders in Account Summary - During the migration of some orders and preorders from our old system to the new system, some orders failed to transfer correctly. These orders were securely retained on the old system whilst our technical teams worked to move them correctly. This took us longer than we had anticipated but during this period, all the affected orders were held safe and any concerns that they had been accidentally cancelled are not founded. There remain a small number of orders that have yet to be migrated and we continue to work to resolve this as soon as possible. If you are still missing an order from your "Track Order" page, we are aware of the issue and you do not need to alert us to the fact, however if you wish to discuss any missing orders, please contact us via email at customer.services@game.co.uk.

Missing Order Cancellation Button -As a result of the issues we experienced during the migration of some orders from our old system to the new one, we took the precautionary step of removing the "cancel or amend" option from some preorders within the "Order Tracking" page. Customers who wished to amend or cancel an affected order were asked to contact our Customer Service team so that they could make the required order changes. This was a precaution that has now been removed for most orders. There remains a handful of orders that are still held in a protected state and we are working to contact the customers concerned to resolve any outstanding issues.

Missing Reward Card Points - Some customers have reported issues or discrepancies with their Reward Card balances. We have seen some delays in updating account balances in some circumstances. Please note that balances are being displayed in units of £2-50, this may not reflect your full points balance. However all Reward Point activity is being accurately recorded and the majority of discrepancies will be resolved in due course. Please allow a couple of days for your balance to update, following any activity. If after this time you still have a query, please contact our Customer Service teams via email at customer.services@game.co.uk

Finally, during the post-launch period we have seen much higher volumes of customer queries across all of our communication channels, be that email, on the 'phones and across Twitter and Facebook.

We know that we have inconvenienced many of you and would like to apologies again for this. Our teams are working to ensure that we resolve as many of your calls as swiftly as we possibly can and we are extremely appreciative of your continued patience as we do this.

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2 comments

What on Earth are Game up to? It looks like a series of cost-cutting measures have been put in place, starting with the introduction of a new delivery contractor, Citipost, in June and their new website - presumably part of business process merging with Gamestop and other Game brand Gameplay. But why do this in the run up to the busiest time of the year?

If Game take their eye off the ball (GAMEfest starts this weekend) these cost-cutting measures could lead to management heads being lined up for the chop too.

Its difficult to know what exactly is going on with GAME but here's my guess. Its all do do with share price. In June GAME brought Citipost on board to handle non-next-day post. This included new releases and meant that new games weren't delivered on time. Much cheaper for GAME but they've lost some(*1) customers over this.

Then came the website upgrade (started a month ago and still not complete esp. related to pre-order management.) Its difficult from a customer-point-of-view to see any benefits. Indeed GAME will have lost customers over the new website. The inability to manage pre-orders does leave a bad taste. Is this by design (the bad design) or just plain incompetency? We may never know but it must be the latter. The reason for the new website? Quite simply its part of back-office process streamlining with an aim to provide consistent processes between GAME, Gameplay and Gamestation. GAME are cutting costs. You cannot blame them when you consider that they're up against the likes of The Evil Amazon (*2) they don't really have much choice.

So its all about...cost cutting to impress shareholders. But with the silly season approaching (November big releases) the guy who's job it was to bring the new website online should be sacked ASAP (you NEVER test a new website on your customers.)

(*1) Its difficult to know how much of a market share GAME had with new orders. Many punters pre-order and pick up from shops and so GAME would have done a cost/benefit analysis and Citipost won.

(*2) Amazon are not really evil but like Tesco their ultimate plan is world domination.

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